Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to indulge in petty theft; to take surreptitiously; thus cribbing n.

1732		Harlot’s Progress 34: Rejoicing at a Watch she crib’d / The Night before, from one that nib’d.
1758		R. Dodsley King and Miller of Mansfield 19: He cribs, without Scruple, from other Men’s Sacks.
1772		Foote Nabob in Works (1799) II 298: There are a brace of birds and a hare, that I cribbed this morning out of a basket of game.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: To Crib, to purloin, or appropriate to one’s own use, part of anything entrusted to one’s care.
1795		Sporting Mag. Nov. VII 81/1: We would niver have cribb’d your papers.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum [as cit. 1785].
1822		Westmorland Gaz. 7 Sept. 4/5: There were to be found [...] knowing-ones [...] and those who entrap the most scientific, either at cribbing a tattler or a fawney.
1833		Mr Mathews’ Comic Annual 22: Each one suspects his neighbour of bribery; / Each thinks t’other cribs, / By planning, the dibs, / And truth when asserted, is thought to be fibs.
1836–7		Dickens Pickwick Papers (1999) 422: Child, being fond of toys, cribbed the necklace.
1843		Satirist & Sporting Chron. (Sydney) 1 Apr. 2/3: Happiest men — if, cribbing votes / With all thy wonted powders of blarney.
1842		Wkly Rake (NY) 24 Sept. n.p.: Monsieur ‘cribbed’ a piece of cheese — he did like cheese .
1845		R.S. Surtees Hillingdon Hall I 264: [of a speech] I’m a goin’ to do a bit of antiquity myself — cribbed of course, but that’s nothin’.
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open.
1850		‘Ned Buntline’ G’hals of N.Y. 139: To leave it, would be a certain loss to you, for, as I said before, the stars would be sure to crib it.
1865		Potter Jrnl (Coudersport, PA) 25 Jan. 1/4: On a starvation salary the temptation to crib from the change drawer is often too strong.
1869		J. Greenwood Seven Curses of London 407: It is not stealing [...] this tearing fourteen stamps from a sheet at which everybody in the office has access, and which will be replaced without question as soon as it is exhausted. It is at most only ‘cribbing’.
1874		S. Baker Ismailia II 252: No thefts had been allowed, not even those trifling annexations of property which are distinguished from stealing by the innocent name of ‘cribbing’.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 18 Apr. 20/1: The writers in a newspaper office in Melbourne had a vigorous hunt for a Russian lately [...] and with the view to cribbing a little local colour, an intelligent quill-driver was sent out to talk the situation over with one of the Russian residents of the city.
1888		St Paul Dly Globe 28 July 10/6: The above-mentioned comrades [...] did on or about July 19 [...] enter the chicken coop of a comrade and did [...] steal, purloin, rob, crib, cabbage, abstract, or otherwise carry away, eleven chickens.
1892		‘Man-Trap’ in ‘F. Anstey’ Mr Punch’s Model Music Hall 94: He’s always cribbing coppers – which he spends on lollipops.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 20: Crib, to steal.
1900		Boy’s Own Paper 1 Dec. 132: We hadn’t cribbed Rawbone’s money.
1910		‘Doss Chiderdoss’ ‘Games For Girls’ Sporting Times 20 Aug. 1/3: Schoolgirls crib the schoolboys’ games.
1917		Mt Vernon Signal (KY) 2 Nov. 4/3: It shall be unlawful to pick up [...] steal, seize, [...] pilfer, purloin [...] crib, cabbage [...] another man’s umbrella.
1929		(con. 1916) F. Manning Her Privates We (1986) 24: ’E’s been cribbin’ everything.
1940		M. Marples Public School Slang 8: Stealing or appropriating [...] crib .
1960, 1975		Wentworth & Flexner DAS.

2. to take some money out of one’s wages or an amount set aside for essentials.

1748		Dyche & Pardon New General Eng. Dict. (5th edn) n.p.: Crib to withhold, keep back, pinch, or thieve a part out of money given to lay out for necessaries.
1869		‘Rights of Women’ in C. Hindley Curiosities of Street Lit. (1871) 82: You must not crib a shilling from your wages on Saturday night.

3. to obtain a new recruit for the services; the implication is by using trickery.

1879

H. Hartigan Stray Leaves (2nd ser.) 63: Very queer things were in vogue when he was a young fellow to crib men for the service.